Psychedelic rock

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Psychedelic rock
Stylistic originsBritish Invasion, folk, blues, ragas, tape music, folk rock, garage rock
Cultural originsMid 1960s United States
Typical instrumentsElectric guitar (usually with guitar effects (fuzz, phaser, etc.)- Bass guitar - Hammond organ - drums - sitar - Mellotron - Moog synthesizer - Theremin studio sound effects (e.g., recordings played backwards)
Derivative formsProgressive rock - hard rock - heavy metal - art rock - kosmische musik - space rock - ambient - zeuhl - new age music
Subgenres
Acid rock - psychedelic pop - stoner rock - desert rock - neo-psychedelia
Fusion genres
Acid punk

Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that attempts to replicate the mind-altering experiences of hallucinogenic drugs[1] by using lyrics that use bizarre sounds created by altering the instruments and vocals with electronic effects such as tape-loop echoes and delays, phase shifting, or reversed sounds.

Psychedelic rock is a bridge from early blues-based rock to progressive rock and heavy metal, but it also drew on non-Western sources such as Indian music's rāgas and sitars. Unlike acid rock, which refers to styles overlapping with hard rock or heavy metal, psychedelic rock is generally more mellow. There are also other forms of psychedelic music that started from the same roots and diverged from the prevalent rock style into electronic music.

History

While the first musicians to be influenced by psychedelic drugs were in the jazz and folk scenes, the first use of the term "psychedelic" in popular music was by the "acid-folk" group The Holy Modal Rounders in 1964, with the song "Hesitation Blues". The first use of the word "psychedelic" in a rock music context is usually credited to The Deep, and the earliest known appearance of this usage of the word in print is in the title of their 1966 album The Psychedelic Moods of the Deep. Roky Erickson, lead singer of The 13th Floor Elevators, coined the term 'psychedelic rock'[citation needed] in a 1966 interview. In 1962 British rock embarked on a frenetic race of ideas that spread back to the U.S. with the British Invasion. The folk music scene also experimented with outside influences. In the tradition of Jazz and blues many musicians began to take drugs, and include drug references in their songs. By late 1965 The Beatles Rubber Soul album, which featured John Lennon's first paean to universal love ("The Word") and a sitar-laden tale of attempted hippy hedonism ("Norwegian Wood"). The British rock act The Yardbirds recorded the single Happenings Ten Years Time Ago in 1966, which is frequently cited as the first psychedelic song due to its frantic evocation of drug-induced paranoia.

US in the 1960s

The Byrds' Fifth Dimension (1966)

Psychedelia began in the United States' folk scene, with New York City's Holy Modal Rounders introducing the term in 1964. A similar band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions from San Francisco were influenced by The Byrds and the Beatles to switch from acoustic music to electric music in 1965. Renaming themselves the Warlocks, they fell in with Ken Kesey's LSD-fuelled Merry Pranksters in November 1965, and changed their name to the Grateful Dead the following month. The Dead played to light shows at the Pranksters' "Acid Tests", with pulsing images being projected over the group in what became a widespread practice.

Their sound soon became identified as Acid rock which they played at the Trips Festival in January 1966 along with Big Brother & the Holding Company. The festival was held at the Longshoremen's Hall and was attended by some 10,000 people. For most of the attendees, it was their first encounter with both acid-rock and LSD. Another band, originally playing R&B called The Ethix started to experiment with electronics, tape transformations and wild improvisations, and as their music transformed, The Ethix transformed into Fifty Foot Hose.

Throughout 1966, the San Francisco music scene flourished, as the Fillmore, the Avalon Ballroom, and the Matrix club began booking local rock bands on a nightly basis. The emerging "San Francisco Sound" made local stars of numerous bands, including the Charlatans, Moby Grape, Big Brother and the Holding Company, Fifty Foot Hose,Quicksilver Messenger Service, Country Joe and the Fish, The Great Society, and the folk-rockers Jefferson Airplane, whose debut album was recorded during the winter of 1965/66 and released in August 1966. Jefferson Airplane Takes Off was the first album to come out of San Francisco during this era and sold well enough to bring the city's music scene to the attention of the record industry.

Jefferson Airplane gained greater fame the following year with two of the earliest psychedelic hit singles: "White Rabbit" and "Somebody to Love". In fact, both these songs had originated with the band The Great Society, whose singer Grace Slick left them to accept an offer to join Jefferson Airplane, taking the two compositions with her.

While the Grateful Dead were the acknowledged leaders of the San Francisco music scene in the 1960s by both local concert-goers and rival bands, their records did not sell as well as those of their Bay Area peers. As a result, the Grateful Dead didn't begin to attain national popularity until around 1969-1970, when their constant touring gained them a cult following.

Although San Francisco receives much of the credit for jumpstarting the psychedelic music scene, many other American cities contributed significantly to the new genre. Los Angeles boasted dozens of important psychedelic bands, including the Byrds, Iron Butterfly, Love, Spirit, the United States of America, Jimi Hendrix, and the Doors, among others. New York City produced its share of psychedelic bands such as the Blues Magoos, the Blues Project, Bermuda Triangle Band, Electric Prunes and the Third Bardo. The Detroit area gave rise to psychedelic bands the Amboy Dukes and the SRC. Texas (particularly Austin) is often cited for its contributions to psychedelic music, being home to the groundbreaking 13th Floor Elevators, as well as Bubble Puppy, Shiva's Headband, Golden Dawn, the Zakary Thaks, Red Krayola, and many others.

The Byrds went psychedelic in 1966 with "Eight Miles High", a song with odd vocal harmonies and an extended guitar solo that guitarist Roger McGuinn states was inspired by Raga and John Coltrane.

In 1965, members of Rick And The Ravens and The Psychedelic Rangers came together with Jim Morrison to form The Doors. They made a demo tape for Columbia Records in September of that year, which contained glimpses of their later acid-rock sound. When nobody at Columbia wanted to produce the band, they were signed by Elektra Records, who released their debut album in January 1967. It contained their first hit single, "Light My Fire." Clocking in at over 7 minutes, it became one of the first rock singles to break the mold of the three-minute pop song, although the version usually played on AM radio was a much-shorter version.

Initially, The Beach Boys, with their squeaky-clean image, seemed unlikely as psychedelic types. Their music, however, grew more psychedelic and experimental, perhaps due in part to writer/producer/arranger Brian Wilson's increased drug usage and burgeoning mental illness. In 1966, responding to the Beatles' innovations, they produced their album Pet Sounds and later that year had a massive hit with the psychedelic single "Good Vibrations". Wilson's magnum opus SMiLE (which was never finished, and was remade by Wilson with a new band in 2004) also shows this growing experimentation.

The psychedelic influence was also felt in black music, where record labels such as Motown dabbled for a while with psychedelic soul, producing such hits as "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)" and "Psychedelic Shack" (by The Temptations), "Reflections" (by Diana Ross & the Supremes), and the 11-minute-long "Time Has Come Today" by The Chambers Brothers, before falling out of favor. Sly and the Family Stone, a racially integrated group whose roots were in soul and R&B, created music influenced by psychedelic rock. This is especially evident on their breakthrough second album, Dance to the Music.

Britain in the 1960s

In the United Kingdom,By late 1965 The Beatles were hinting toward psychedlia Rubber Soul album, which featured John Lennon's first paean to universal love ("The Word") and a sitar-laden tale of attempted hippy hedonism ("Norwegian Wood"). Instrumental freakouts appeared on "The Word" and "I'm Looking Through You", while "Girl" featured a weird breathing sound in the refrain. The August 1966 album The BeatlesRevolver featured psychedelia more intensely in "Tomorrow Never Knows" and in "Yellow Submarine." The latter song combined psychedelic elements with appeal to children and nostalgia, a formula which they would repeat and which would keep their music widely popular. The album also had psychedelic elements in "Love You To", "She Said, She Said", and "Doctor Robert".

Donovan, going electric like Dylan, had a 1966 hit with "Sunshine Superman," one of the very first overtly psychedelic pop records. Pink Floyd had been developing experimental rock with light shows since 1965 in the underground culture scene, and in 1966 the Soft Machine formed. From a blues rock background, the British supergroup Cream debuted in December. The Jimi Hendrix Experience with Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell brought Jimi Hendrix fame in Britain, and later in his American homeland.

Pink Floyd's "Arnold Layne" in March 1967 only hinted at their live sound; the Beatles' groundbreaking album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was recorded on nearly all of the same dates as Pink Floyd's first album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Cream showed their psychedelic sounds the same year in Disraeli Gears. In the folk scene itself blues, drugs, jazz and eastern influences had featured since 1964 in the work of Davy Graham and Bert Jansch, and in 1967 the Incredible String Band's The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion developed this into full blown psychedelia. Other artists joining the psychedelic revolution included Eric Burdon (previously of The Animals), and The Small Faces. The Who's Sell Out had two early psychedelic tracks, "I Can See for Miles" and "Armenia City in the Sky", but the album concept was out of tune with the times, and it was their later album Tommy that established them in the scene.

The Rolling Stones had drug references and psychedelic hints in their 1966 singles "19th Nervous Breakdown" and "Paint It, Black", then the fully psychedelic Their Satanic Majesties Request ("In Another Land") suffered from the problems the group was having at the time, but has been considered a classic. In 1968 Jumpin' Jack Flash and Beggars Banquet re-established them, but their disastrous concert at Altamont in 1969 ended the dream on a downer.


With 1967's The Beatles releases that the band embraced a colourful new frontier. "Strawberry Fields Forever" was the first song recorded intended for an album about nostalgia and childhood in 1966. Brian Epstein hastily released the first two songs recorded which would have ended up on the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album. It was released as a double-A sided single along with "Penny Lane" on February 13, 1967 in the UK and on February 17, 1967 in the U.S. "Strawberry Fields Forever" induced a "magic carpet" of sound, with its unusual chord progression, a kaleidoscope of instruments and effects, and an unusual edit of two completely separate versions (the latter of which had to be slowed down to fit.) topped off with a false ending.

The album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (partially influenced by their studio neighbors Pink Floyd --then recording The Piper at the Gates of Dawn-- and vice versa) was a veritable encyclopedia of psychedelia (among other elements), as well as an explosion of creativity that would set the standard for rock albums decades later. From the title track to "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" to "Within You Without You" to "A Day in the Life", the album showcased a wildly colourful palette, with unpredictable changes in rhythm, texture, melody, and tone colour that few groups could equal.

The single "All You Need Is Love", debuted for a worldwide audience on the "Our World" television special, restated the message of "The Word", but with a Sgt. Pepper style arrangement. Yet after the death of Brian Epstein and the unpopular television movie Magical Mystery Tour (with an uneven soundtrack album accompanying it) the band returned to a more raw style in 1968, albeit a more earthy and complex version than had been heard before Rubber Soul.

Around the same time The Beatles were recording Sgt. Pepper, another British group was recording their first international album. Upon returning to England from Australia, The Bee Gees wrote and recorded their debut LP, Bee Gees' 1st, which contained such psychedelic songs such as "Every Christian Lion Hearted Man Will Show You", "New York Mining Disaster 1941" and "Turn Of The Century". The Bee Gees continued throughout the remainder of the 60's in the psychedelic/baroque rock style with albums such as "Horizontal", "Idea" and the classic double album "Odessa". After a 16 month break-up and reunion, The Bee Gees completely reinvented their sound in the early 1970's into a more R&B/Soul style. Many rock critics consider the 1960's era Bee Gees as their classic period.

Australasia

Australia and New Zealand have long been overlooked in the history of popular music, especially in relation to psychedelic rock and pop, although it was a fertile region for recordings in this genre. One of the main reasons for the relative obscurity of Australasian psychedelia was that few bands from the region had any significant commercial success outside their home countries; the most notable exception was The Easybeats, who scored an international hit in late 1966 with their classic single "Friday On My Mind" (which was in fact recorded in the UK).[citation needed] Another limiting factor was that some of the best Australasian psychedelic records were pressed in tiny quantities (sometimes as few as 250 copies) and very few ever gained significant overseas distribution (if any). As a result, releases from these countries were for many years known only to a small coterie of international music fans and, not surprisingly, their rarity means that they now command high prices on the collector's market. However, since the advent of the CD and the re-release of many of these important recordings, the original psychedelic rock of the 1960s from Australia and New Zealand has gradually gained wider recognition, culminating in the inclusion of a number of seminal tracks on the second volume of the famous Nuggets series, originated by US musician Lenny Kaye.

Local musicians and producers were heavily influenced by innovations in British and American psychedelic music, although, for several reasons, British music had a somewhat stronger influence. One major factor was that the EMI company had long enjoyed the dominant market position in both countries. Another influence was that many Australasian bands like The Easybeats and The Twilights included members who were recent immigrants from the UK. Also, it was common for many groups to receive regular "care packages" from relatives and friends in Britain, containing singles, albums, the latest Carnaby Street fashions and even off-air tape recordings of British and European radio broadcasts. As a result, considering the distance and travel times involved, local Australian and New Zealand bands were kept remarkably up to date with the latest trends. The Bee Gees (then living in Australia) are known to have recorded cover versions of Beatles songs like "Rain" and "Paperback Writer" within days of the singles being released in the UK.

Several Australian groups traveled to the UK during this fertile period -- The Easybeats went to London in late 1966, and around the same time Australia's other leading pop band The Twilights won the inaugural Hoadleys National Battle of the Sounds competition, enabling them to also travel to the UK. As they were signed to EMI, The Twilights were able to record at the legendary Abbey Road during the period of the making of Sgt Peppers. On returning to Australia in early 1967, they wowed audiences in Melbourne by performing complete live renditions of the entire Sgt Peppers album, weeks before it was even released in the UK.

Although the standard of recording studios in Australia and New Zealand lagged several years behind those in the UK and the USA, local producers and engineers like Pat Aulton kept in close touch with the latest overseas trends and worked hard to fashion equivalent sounds for local acts, despite many technical challenges (including the fact that Australia did not get its first commercial 8-track studio until 1969). Local producers and musicians created a significant body of psychedelic recordings, and notable albums and singles recorded by Australian/New Zealand acts in the late 1960s include:

Other countries

The invention of psychedelic music in the US quickly spread and was followed all over the world. The first continental Europe band was Group 1850, of The Netherlands, formed in 1964, first album in 1968. The Brazilian psychedelic rock group Os Mutantes formed in 1966, and although little known outside Brazil at the time, their recordings have since accrued a substantial international cult following.

In the late 1960's a wave of Mexican rock heavily influenced by psychedelic and funk rock emerged in several northern border Mexican states, in particular in Tijuana, Baja California. Among the most recognized bands from this "Chicano Wave" (Onda Chicana in Spanish), there is one in particular that was recognized by their originality. The band Love Army derived from the Tijuana Five and was formed by Alberto Isiordia (aka El Pajaro), Salvador Martinez, Jaime Valle, Fernando Vahaux, Ernesto Hernandez, Mario Rojas and Enrique Sida.

From 1967 to 1973, between the ending of the government of President Frei Montalva and the government of President Allende, a cultural movement was born from a few Chilean bands that emerged playing a unique fusion of folkloric music with heavy psychedelic influences. The 1967 release of Los Mac's album "Kaleidoscope men" inspired many bands such as Los Jaivas and Los Blops, the latter going on to collaborate with the iconic Chilean singer-songwriter Victor Jara on his 1971 album "El derecho de vivir en paz."

Meanwhile in the Argentinian capital Buenos Aires, a burgeoning psychedelic scene gave birth to three of the most important bands in Argentine Rock: Los Gatos, Manal and perhaps most importantly Almendra. Almendra was fronted by Luis Alberto Spinetta who penned most of the band's songs on their two albums released in 1969 and 1970, drawing on a number of influences including Blues, Jazz and Folk. Spinetta's first solo release in 1971 "Spinettalandia y Sus Amigos - La Búsqueda de la Estrella" is also notable for its strong psychedelic influences. Spinetta has since gone on to enjoy a long and successful career in Argentina.

A thriving psychedelic music scene in Cambodia was pioneered by Sinn Sisamouth and Ros Sereysothea. In 1972, from Canada, Frank Marino's Mahogany Rush, named for Marino's experience while doing LSD[2], offered the album "Maxoom" in the psychedelic genre. The title song Maxoom is another early psychedelic song. The band followed this release with Child of the Novelty in 1974. The cover art is an artists representation of Marino's description of an acid trip.

Late 1960s

Many of the bands that pioneered psychedelic rock left it by the end of the 1960s. The increasingly hostile political environment and the embrace of amphetamines, heroin and cocaine by the underground led to a turn toward harsher music. At the same time, Bob Dylan released John Wesley Harding and the Band released Music from Big Pink, both albums that followed a roots-oriented approach. Many bands in England and America followed suit. Eric Clapton cites Music from Big Pink as a primary reason for quitting Cream, for example.[citation needed] The Grateful Dead also went back to basics and had major successes with Workingman's Dead and American Beauty in 1970, then continued to develop their live music and produce a long string of records over the next twenty-five years.

Miles Davis released In A Silent Way and Bitches Brew in 1969. These two releases brought Jazz-Rock Fusion to the attention of the Flower-Power generation, electrifying Jazz in the same way that Dylan had electrified Folk music several years earlier. Musical styles within the Psychedelic camp diverged between wild progressive experimentation and back-to-roots fundamentalism, but with an all-round increase in sophistication.

Comus First Utterance (1971)

Fairport Convention released What We Did On Our Holidays in January and Dr. Strangely Strange followed suit with Kip of the Serenes later in the year. British Folk-Rock artists eschewed the Country-Rock styles of their American counterparts in favour of traditional British folk tunes and tended to be lyrically less political and more prone to flights of magical fantasy. This whimsical branch of Psychedelia bore much equally strange fruit over the next decade, including releases by Alan Stivell, Comus, Fotheringay, Gentle Giant, Gryphon, Jethro Tull, Mellow Candle, Nick Drake, Pentangle, Roy Harper, Sandy Denny, The Incredible String Band and Trees. The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band has to be mentioned somewhere round here along with Syd Barrett's two solo albums.

Woodstock Music and Art Fair (Woodstock Festival) took place in August 1969 and became one of the most celebrated events in Rock music history. Not wanting to be left out of the fun, The Second Isle of Wight Festival was held for UK fans. Bob Dylan, The Who, The Band, Joe Cocker, Free, Richie Havens, The Moody Blues, The Nice, Tom Paxton, Pentangle and Pretty Things played.

The positive atmosphere was sadly not to last long; News of the Tate and LaBianca murders committed by Charles Manson and his "family" of followers, claiming to have been inspired by Beatles' Songs, darkened the horizon. At the end of the year, a Free Concert was held at the Altamont Speedway in California. The concert, which was headlined by The Rolling Stones, was marred by crowd violence. The event became notorious for the now-famous "Gimme Shelter" incident because of the fatal stabbing of black teenager Meredith Hunter in front of the stage by Hell's Angel security guards after he allegedly pulled out a revolver during the Stones' performance. Flower Power officially died at Altamont. Shortly afterwards, The Beatles announced that they had split up. John Lennon, George Harrison and the others continued with solo careers.

The Flower Power era had inspired many new bands to experiment with sound in ways that went beyond the fashion of the times. Despite these set-backs, the psychedelic soup continued to bubble away. Bubble Puppy's album A Gathering of Promises demonstrates the degree of sophistication that Psychedelic Pop had reached by the end of the '60's.

Can Monster Movie (1969)

German band Can instantiated the development of Krautrock with the release of their Monster Movie album. Along with European experimentalists Amon Düül II, Ash Ra Tempel, Guru Guru, Harmonia, Neu! and Xhol Caravan they incorporated avant-garde composition techniques, improvisation and experimental rhythms into their music. Neu!'s 'Motorik' beat was an influential precursor to the drum-machine grooves of the '80's. Can's adoption of World Music influences and particularly North African rhythms lent releases such as Tago Mago, Ege Bamyasi, and Future Days a particularly unique sound.

Other artists like David Vorhaus and Delia Derbyshire pursued the potential of new soundscapes made possible by the development of electronic musical instruments, as the Silver Apples had done before them, in their album of experimental electronica An Electric Storm - released under the moniker of White Noise. During the '70's, pure synthesiser music would be further developed by artists like Tangerine Dream and Tim Blake.

In Brazil, Os Mutantes were drawn into the Tropicália movement, while Santana adopted electrified Latin rhythms to form the basis of their music on Abraxas and Caravanserai.

The Psychedelic 70's

In March 1970, the new super-group Crosby Stills Nash and Young released Deja Vu. CSNY was formed from members of The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and The Hollies and went on to become one of the biggest selling artists of this era. In May Four students at Kent State University in Ohio were killed by National Guardsmen at a demonstration to protest against The USA's invasion of Cambodia, the subject was covered by Neil Young in his song Ohio. He split Crosby Stills and Nash to pursue a solo career and release many albums over the next couple of decades. Many of the original Psychedelic bands like The Beach Boys, Moby Grape, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Spirit, Strawberry Alarm Clock, The Nazz and Vanilla Fudge were still producing albums in the early '70's. Todd Rundgren left Nazz and released numerous solo albums such as: A Wizard, A True Star; Faithful; and Initiation, earning himself a dedicated cult following.

Whereas American psychedelia was informed by radical politics and the experience of war in Vietnam, British Psychedelia expressed much more of a whimsical domesticity, a fascination with childhood as a lost age of innocence and a hankering after the pastoral idyll. Lyrical ideas were inspired by a healthy dose of fantasy from the likes of Tolkien, Lewis Carrol and the Wind in the Willows, and further modulated by the free availability of magic mushrooms. As the 70's progressed, Glam Rock, Heavy Metal, Progressive Rock, Folk and Jazz Rock styles took over the fashionable focus, but many artists still held to Hippy ideals, producing some of their finest work in this era.

Hawkwind Space Ritual (1972)

The third Isle of Wight festival took place over 5 days in August 1970. Jimi Hendrix, Joan Baez, The Doors, The Who, Procol Harum, Tony Joe White and Redbone were the main headliners. Hawkwind played for free outside the gates in protest against ticket prices and to promote their eponymous first album. Festivals became regular fixtures during the British summers of the '70's. The first Glastonbury Festival was held in 1971 on a little farm in Somerset. Hawkwind became champions of the Free Festival movement, playing at Windsor Free Festival and subsequently regularly headlined Stonehenge Free Festival. They released numerous albums: Doremi Fasol Latido; In Search of Space; Space Ritual; Warrior On The Edge Of Time; In The Hall Of The Mountain Grill; Astounding Sounds Amazing Music; and Quark Strangeness and Charm and were a major influence in the development of Space Rock and Heavy Metal along with High Tide and Blue Cheer. This period of Hawkwind's long history is also notable for the particular contribution of Robert Calvert as vocalist and lyricist.

Jimi Hendrix died in London in September, shortly after recording Band of Gypsies and Janis Joplin Died of heroin overdose in October 1970. The two were closely followed by Jim Morrison, who died in Paris in July 1971. The Sex, Drugs and Rock'n'Roll lifestyle had started to take its toll.

Alongside the progressive stream, space rock bands such as Hawkwind, Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come and Gong maintained a more explicitly psychedelic course into the 1970s.

1971 also saw the release of Camembert Electrique by Gong, who combined World Music with Jazz Rock and an absurdist storyline to produce the Radio Gnome trilogy: Flying Teapot; Angel's Egg; and You. Gong were loosely aligned with a musical collective based in the 'Home Counties' of England that became known as the Canterbury Scene. The music of Arthur Brown, Arzachel, Caravan, Egg, Hatfield & the North, Kevin Ayers, Khan, Matching Mole, National Health, Robert Wyatt, Soft Machine and Steve Hillage is unified to some degree by its experimentation with odd time-signatures, jazz structures and it's rather homely, dadaist lyrical concepts.

Gong Angel's Egg (1973)

The musicians and bands that continued to embrace psychedelia often went on to create progressive rock in the 1970s, which maintained the love of unusual sounds and extended solos but added jazz and classical influences to the mix. For example, progressive rock group Yes sprang out of three British psychedelic bands: Syn (featuring Chris Squire), Tomorrow (featuring Steve Howe) and Mabel Greer's Toy Shop (Jon Anderson). Also, psychedelic rock strongly influenced early heavy metal bands such as Black Sabbath. Psychedelic rock, with its distorted guitar sound and adventurous compositions can be seen as an important bridge between heavy metal and earlier blues oriented rock.

Psychedelia resurfaced in the work of other Progessive Rock acts like Curved Air, King Crimson, Manfred Mann's Earth Band, Pink Floyd, Procol Harum, Quiet Sun, Supersister and The Enid. The Moody Blues continued to develop their symphonic themes over the course of several albums: A Question Of Balance; Every Good Boy Deserves Favour; On The Threshold of a Dream; Seventh Sojourn; and To Our Children's Children. Traffic also produced several classics of the genre during this time including John Barleycorn Must Die and Shoot Out at the Fantasy Factory.

In January 1973, the Vietnam War ended with the signing of peace pacts. In May and June, the break-ins at the Watergate hotel hit the news. The U.S. bombing of Cambodia ended in August, marking an official halt to 12 years of combat activity in Southeast Asia.

Brian Eno released Here Come the Warm Jets in February 1974, followed by Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy in November. Albums released by 801, Phil Manzanera, Roy Wood and Wizzard also display strong Psychedelic tendencies.

In February 1974 Jefferson Airplane change their name to Jefferson Starship for legal reasons. '70's Albums released before the name change include: Volunteers, B.A.R.K. and Sunfighter.

Richard Nixon resigns over Watergate affair in August. Three of The Beatles sue Allen Klein in November. Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft take off for U.S.-Soviet link-up in space in July 1975. The Ebola virus wipes out millions in Zaire.

The Grateful Dead took 1975 off from touring. The pressure of the ever-expanding organisation required to produce albums and deal with the logistics of touring was getting out of hand. The "Wall of Sound" PA that dominated live shows was stretching their resources beyond endurable limits and forcing them to play bigger and bigger halls. Notable albums from this period include: Europe '72; Blues For Allah; and Terrapin Station.

The Sex Pistols released their first single, Anarchy in the UK in November 1976. A Bad year for Psychedelia, this "Wizards & Elves" stuff definitely isn't fashionable any more. Only Hawkwind appeared to survive the onslaught of punk with any real dignity. Star Wars was released in the following year, reshaping the face of high-budget cinema forever. Roland released the first programmable drum machine, the CR-88 and the the DR55 in the following year. Gryphon released their last album Treason and were then dumped unceremoniously by EMI to make way for the Sex Pistols, treason indeed!

Sandy Denny died aged 31 of a cerebral haemorrhage, after falling down a flight of stairs on 21st April 1978.

Psychedelia gained a new lease of life by merging with Festival Punk in the UK, giving birth to Space Punk bands such as Here & Now and Nik Turner's Sphynx, who had taken their lead from bands like the Pink Fairies and Hawkwind. Daevid Allen and Gilli Smyth hooked up with Here & Now to make the Planet Gong album Live Floating Anarchy '77.

In 1979, Pink Floyd release The Wall.

Neo-Psychedelia

Main article: Neo-psychedelia

Although the groups listed here are labeled with the Psychedelic moniker, and it should be noted that some Psychedelic purists claim that much of the sound is actually quite different from the original Psychedelic bands and production from the sixties, thus pointing to different terminology, such as Revival Rock or Modern Rock. Phish, a jam band active from the early 1980s, played psychedelic music with a strong jazz influence, utilizing elaborate modal melodies and complex rhythmic accompaniment. In the mid 1980s a Los Angeles-based movement named the Paisley Underground acknowledged a debt to the Byrds, incorporating psychedelia into a folksy, jangle pop sound.

The Bangles were arguably the most successful band to emerge from this movement; amongst others involved were Green on Red, the Three O'Clock, The Dream Syndicate, Milwaukee's Plasticland, The Secret Syde, The Inn and Lord John. Although not directly involved in the movement, Australian band The Church (who formed in 1980) were also heavily influenced by psychedelia and their early recordings, had much in common with their Paisely Underground contemporaries.

In the mid-eighties and early nineties The Flaming Lips (and later, Mercury Rev) played psychedelic guitar rock, but by the late nineties both bands had largely abandoned an electric guitar-effects driven sound, instead incorporating orchestral and electronica influences into their music.

A British counterpoint to the Paisley Underground was a number of post-New Wave bands, including The Soft Boys and the solo albums of their singer Robyn Hitchcock, and The Teardrop Explodes and its vocalist Julian Cope. Hitchcock was heavily influenced by Syd Barrett and John Lennon. In the mid 1980s, The Shamen began with a self-consciously psychedelic curriculum influenced by Barrett and Love, before reorienting itself towards rave. Other British dabblers in psychedelia included Nick Nicely, XTC and Martin Newell with The Cleaners from Venus, The Barracudas, Mood Six, The Prisoners, Echo and the Bunnymen, and The Brotherhood of Lizards.

British band XTC made a number of recordings in the late 1980s which both parodied and affectionately imitated the sound and form of late Sixties psychedelic rock. Released under the pseudonym The Dukes of Stratosphear and produced by former Abbey Road engineer John Leckie, the EP 25 O'Clock (1985) and the LP Psonic Psunspot (1987) employ all of the classic songwriting and production features of the style. XTC leader Andy Partridge has claimed that he always wanted to play in a psychedelic band.

Beginning in the late 1980s, travelers, musicians, and artists from around the world formed a new form of psychedelic music in the Indian state of Goa. Initially called Goa trance, this psychedelic music was the result of mixing the 1960s influences with industrial music and electronica. Popular hard rock artists also made several psychedelic songs, including REM and Prince, who released several Psychedelic-styled records including Around the World in a Day.

The group Kula Shaker, under the leadership of Crispin Mills, created much Indian-influenced psychedelic music, such as the singles "Tattva" and "Govinda," both sung in Sanskrit, and the albums "K" and "Peasants, Pigs and Astronauts." Bands such as Ozric Tentacles and the Welsh Gorky's Zygotic Mynci play psychedelic music in a tradition that goes back to the 1960s via acts such as Steve Hillage, Gong and their assorted side projects. The influential 1980's Space Rock band Spacemen 3 created a unique psychedelic drone sound that was influenced by many of the dark primitive psychedelic/garage bands of the 1960's and 1970's, such as The Stooges, MC5, The Velvet Underground, Red Krayola, and The 13th Floor Elevators. Spacemen 3's live shows would often consist of them jamming out on one chord for over forty-five minutes. Primal Scream have psychedelic themes throughout much of their earlier music.

British bands Anomie and My Bloody Valentine play British garage psychedelia, citing Pink Floyd and Hawkwind as musical influences. Some electronic or electronic-influenced music termed "ambient" or "trance" such as Aphex Twin or Orbital, had it been written between 1966 and 1990, would have fallen within the category of psychedelia. Later Psychedelic trance artists such as Hallucinogen and Shpongle have continued the psychedelic music tradition within a dance-oriented context. Stoner rock acts like Kyuss, Nebula and their successors also perform explicitly psychedelic music. Bands such as The Smashing Pumpkins and Tool fused psychedelic rock sounds with heavy metal, becoming highly successful alternative rock acts in the 1990s.

In Australia in the 1980s, bands such as The Tripps, Prince Vlad & the Gargoyle Impalers, and most notably Tyrnaround and The Moffs, explored and reinvigorated the psychedelic genre. Japan has had a rich history of psychedelic music, dating back to the 1960s. Starting with the "Group Sounds" movement, which mainly included psychedelic-garage acts, such as The Mops and most notably The Jacks. The 1970s introduced the element of sonic experimentation and noise manipulation into the realm of Japanese psychedelic rock, with groups like Les Rallizes Denudes, Fushitsusha, Kousokuya, and the Faust inspired Magical Power Mako emerging from the Japanese underground. The 1980s brought with it Japan's first record label dedicated to folk, noise, experimental, and most prominently, psychedelic music -- PSF Records. Rising from the Japanese noise underground, Acid Mothers Temple mix the subtle resonance of Blue Cheer, the Grateful Dead's psychedelic sound, the thought-provoking melodies of French folk, and concrete bursts of noise that run through music of Boredoms.

In recent years, many inventive artists from the Perth-scene in Western Australia, notably the Sleepy Jackson, The Panda Band,The Silents and The Panics have experimented with lush, neo-psychedelic harmonies and avant-garde instrumentation. Other endeavours in experimental rock with psychedelic influences include Neutral Milk Hotel, Animal Collective, the Burnside Shattered, The Apples in Stereo, Of Montreal, and The Olivia Tremor Control: all members of the Elephant 6 musical collective, which is headquartered in Athens, Georgia. Oasis' fourth studio album Standing on the Shoulder of Giants is noted for its heavy psychedelic influences. The Coral, The Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev are also heavily influenced by psychedelic rock.

The grunge band Screaming Trees is noted for its unique fusion of grunge (a genre the band itself had a part in pioneering) and psychedelic rock. The psychedelic influence is especially evident on their later albums, namely Sweet Oblivion. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, a new psychedelic scene flourished in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles. Another band in the scene was Beachwood Sparks. Beachwood Sparks' influences were the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and Gram Parsons and his Flying Burrito Brothers group. Spinning off from the Beachwood Sparks is a band called the Tyde. Producer and musician Rob Campanella played guitar in the jangly Byrds-influenced pop group the Quarter After.

A new British psychedelic scene also re-emerged amongst the London electronica movement in the late 1990s, giving birth to bands like desert rockers MJ13, where the British interpretation of the Kyuss influx showed more psychedelic sensibilities than the American Stoner rock sound was originally attributed to. Australian Group Wolfmother is one of the most successful psychedelic artists of the 2000s.

See also

External links

  • Lysergia reviews, inverviews, and psychedelic history and information
  • Feza Neverd Interesting instrumental music composed by Mehmet Gencler, for free download.

References

  1. ^ Head Sounds [1]
  2. ^ Frank Marino & Mahogany Rush -Band History
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